For you wrestling fans.....

[Dirkgreatness]

Chris Benoit and family found dead: reports'
Canadian Crippler' once lived in Edmonton, Sherwood Park


Professional wrestler Chris Benoit was found dead along with his family this afternoon in his Atlanta home, according to published reports.
The Atlanta-Journal Constitution is reporting authorities confirmed that Benoit, 40, his wife, Nancy, and their 7-year-old son were found dead at the home on Quarters and Redwine roads in Fayetteville.

Officials would not say how the family died, other than to say they weren't shot to death.

The Montreal-born Benoit, who moved to Edmonton when he was 12 years old, lived in Sherwood Park as recently as May 2000.

World Wrestling Entertainment issued a release over Benoit's death.

"World Wrestling Entertainment is deeply saddened to report that today Chris Benoit and his family were found dead in their home," the statement reads.

"There are no further details at this time, other than the Benoit family residence is currently being investigated by local authorities.

WWE spokeswoman Cheryl Kong in Toronto said Monday night’s “Raw” TV program would serve as a tribute to Benoit and his family.

Benoit was a former world heavyweight champion, Intercontinental champion and held several tag-team titles over his career.

Benoit was scheduled to wrestle at the Vengeance pay-per-view Sunday night in Houston, but was replaced at the last minute because of what announcer Jim Ross called “personal reasons.”

-With files from Canadian Press

http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Worl...5/4289665.html

I was shocked when i heard this. Mostly because when i was younger i grew up watching wrestling.

[nah-vit-ski]

Wow, that's terrible. R.I.P to him and his family.

[Male30Dan]

A lot of speculation that this was a double homicide and suicide. Benoit was supposed to wrestle over the weekend in their pay-per-view event but requested out at the last moment for family reasons, (some articles have referenced him saying they were sick and coughing up blood).

Hopefully he didn't kill his wife and child and then himself, (or the wife doing the same). He was really talked about as a huge family man who loved his kids so it is hard to imagine that.

Crazy story.

[Dirkgreatness]

Yeah, they are saying that Benoit killed his family over the weekend. Then, he killed himself on Monday.

[MavsX]

now that shit is nuts.

[Nash13]

It was steroids. WWE, and wrestling in general over the past 10yrs have had a lot of suspicious deaths. I stopped watching it about 4yrs ago. He was one of my favorite wrestlers back in the WCW days.

[Stranger]

What a terrible story. The latest report brings up the steroid question.

link

Report: Benoit strangled wife, smothered son, then hung self
Associated Press

Updated: June 26, 2007, 1:37 PM ET
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ATLANTA -- Pro wrestler Chris Benoit strangled his wife and smothered his son before hanging himself in his weight room, a law enforcement official close to the investigation told The Associated Press on Tuesday.


AP Photo/WWE, HO

Authorities are investigating whether steroids may have been a factor in the deaths of Chris Benoit, above, his wife and child.

Authorities also said they are investigating whether steroids may have been a factor in the deaths of Benoit, his wife and their 7-year-old son. Steroid abuse has been linked to depression, paranoia, and aggressive behavior or angry outbursts known as "roid rage."

"We don't know yet. That's one of the things we'll be looking at," Fayette County District Attorney Scott Ballard said, adding test results may not be back for weeks.

Autopsies were scheduled Tuesday by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Authorities were investigating the deaths at a secluded Fayette County home as a murder-suicide and were not seeking any suspects. The official who described the manner of death spoke on the condition of anonymity because the information was to be released at a news conference later Tuesday.

Investigators believe Benoit (pronounced ben-WAH) killed his wife, 43-year-old Nancy, and son Daniel during the weekend and then himself Monday. The bodies were found Monday afternoon in three separate rooms of the house, off a gravel road about two miles from the Whitewater Country Club.

Fayette County Coroner C.J. Mowell did not return calls seeking comment. The answering service for his funeral home said he was out of town.

Asked about the condition of the interior of the house, sheriff's Sgt. Keith Whiteside said investigators found "nothing really out of the ordinary." He said Benoit was found in the home's weight room, his wife in an office and the son in an upstairs bedroom.

Neighbors said the Benoits led a low-key lifestyle.

"We would see Chris walking in his yard from time to time. He wasn't rude, but he wasn't really outwardly warm," said Alaina Jones, who lives across the street.

Jimmy Baswell, who was Benoit's driver for more than five years, placed a white wreath at the Benoits' gate. "They always seemed like they were the happiest people," he said.

World Wrestling Entertainment said on its Web site that it asked authorities to check on Benoit and his family after being alerted by friends who received "several curious text messages sent by Benoit early Sunday morning."

The WWE, based in Stamford, Conn., said authorities asked that it not release further information on the deaths.

Benoit, born in Montreal, was a former world heavyweight champion, Intercontinental champion and held several tag-team titles. His names in the ring included "The Canadian Crippler."

"WWE extends its sincerest thoughts and prayers to the Benoit family's relatives and loved ones in this time of tragedy," the company said in a statement on its Web site.

"He was like a family member to me, and everyone in my family is taking it real hard," said fellow Canadian Bret Hart, a five-time champion with the World Wrestling Federation. The federation has since changed its name to World Wrestling Entertainment.

Benoit had maintained a home in metro Atlanta from the time he wrestled for the defunct World Championship Wrestling. The Fayette County Tax Assessors Office lists the value of the house, situated on more than 8.5 acres, at nearly $900,000.

The WWE canceled its live "Monday Night RAW" card in Corpus Christi, Texas, and USA Network aired a three-hour tribute to Benoit in place of the scheduled wrestling telecast.

Benoit's wife managed several wrestlers and went by the stage name "Woman." They met when her then-husband drew up a script that had them involved in a relationship as part of a story line on World Championship Wrestling, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

Benoit has two other children from a prior relationship.

Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press

[MavsX]

several curious text messages ?

what the hell does that mean?

[Dirkgreatness]

Note to self: don't do steroids.

[BRIAN27]

http://www.wwe.com/inside/news/chrisbenoittimeline

Early Sunday morning, between 3:51 and 3:58 a.m., Benoit sent five text messages to co-workers:

Text Message 1 to two co-workers (sent 6/24 at 3:53 a.m.) - Chris Benoit’s cell phone
“My physical address is 130 Green Meadow Lane, Fayetteville Georgia. 30215”

Text Message 2 to two co-workers (sent 6/24 at 3:53 a.m.) - Chris Benoit’s cell phone
“The dogs are in the enclosed pool area. Garage side door is open”

Text Message 3 to two co-workers (sent 6/24 at 3:54 a.m.) - Nancy Benoit’s cell phone
“My physical address is 130 Green Meadow Lane.
Fayetteville Georgia. 30215”

Text Message 4 to two co-workers (sent 6/24 at 3:55 a.m.) - Nancy Benoit’s cell phone
“My physical address is 130 Green Meadow Lane.
Fayetteville Georgia. 30215"

Text Message 5 to one co-worker (sent 6/24 at 3:58 a.m.) - Nancy Benoit’s cell phone
“My address is 130 Green Meadow Lane. Fayetteville Georgia. 30215”

[Male30Dan]

So sad... I mean sure, a lot of people go crazy and kill their significant other. That shit is terrible enough. But to go and strangle your 7 year old son after being such a family man all these years. Wow.

He must have had some serious problems or one of the worst steroid-rages ever.

Really unfortunate.

His ex-wife and mother of his other two children should be thanking God that that wasn't her and her kids.

[snoop]

yeah thats just unreal about the wife but the kid is just flat out deperessing

[MavsWiLLHaVeRinGs]

This story gets more and more bizarre. Apparently they were giving their 7 year old kid Human Growth Hormones because he suffered from Fragile X Syndrome.

The story becomes more and more shocking...

In an interview with ESPN.com, Fayetteville, Georgia District Attorney Scott Ballard revealed new information on two text messages that Chris Benoit sent to Chavo Guerrero over the weekend. In the first message, Benoit told Guerrero that Nancy and Daniel Benoit were both sick. It is believed that Benoit sent this message after he had already killed both Nancy and Daniel. In the second message, Benoit told Guerrero that the gates to his house were open and that dogs were outside. It is believed that he sent the second message as a way of making sure the bodies were all found after his suicide.

Even more shocking is that Benoit's son, Daniel, was apparently found with needle marks in his arm. According to Ballard, the boy was being given Human Growth Hormones because the family thought he was undersized.

The article also states that Benoit used weights and the pulley of a piece of exercise equipment to hang himself.

The full ESPN article is available here.

More news continues to fly in regarding the Chris Benoit double murder-suicide....

- A woman claiming to have been a friend of the Benoit family told News 1130 in Vancouver that Benoit's son suffered from Fragile X syndrome but that they had decided to keep the disease secret. The following description of Fragile X syndrome is from Wikipedia.

"Aside from intellectual disability (mental retardation), prominent characteristics of the syndrome include an elongated face, large or protruding ears, flat feet, larger testicals in men (macroorchidism), and low muscle tone. Behavioral characteristics may include stereotypic movements (e.g., hand-flapping) and atypical social development, particularly shyness and limited eye contact. Some individuals with the fragile X syndrome also meet the diagnostic criteria for autism. While full mutation males tend to present with severe intellectual disability, the symptomology of full mutation females runs the gamut of minimally affected to severe intellectual disability, which may explain why females are underdiagnosed relative to males."

The woman stated that the disease is very hard for families to deal with because there is not much help and support for it. This may explain why Benoit's son was being injected with human growth hormones. It should be noted that the woman's story and her status as a friend of the Benoit family has not been confirmed by the Associated Press or any other national media outlet.

- Meanwhile, the Edmonton Sun has an article up on the Benoit story that features quotes from Dr. John Bradford, associate chief of the integrated forensic program for the Royal Ottawa Health Care Group. In the article, Dr. Bradford states that murder-suicides are usually carried out by the father and usually because he believes that the family would be "better off in heaven." He also stated that depression also often plays a factor, and that potential steroid use could lead to rage attacks and depression. Check out the full article here.

[Dirkgreatness]

Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Attorney: Couple argued over care of mentally retarded 7-year-old son

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ESPN.com news services

ATLANTA -- In the days before pro wrestler Chris Benoit killed his wife and child and hanged himself, the couple argued over whether he should stay home more to take care of their mentally retarded 7-year-old son, an attorney for the wrestling league said Wednesday.


Authorities are investigating whether steroids may have been a factor in the deaths of Chris Benoit, above, his wife and child.


"I think it's fair to say that the subject of caring for that child was part of what made their relationship complicated and difficult, and it's something they were both constantly struggling with," said Jerry McDevitt, an attorney for World Wrestling Entertainment. "We do know it was a source of stress and consternation."


McDevitt said the wrestling organization learned from the couple's friends and relatives that the Benoits were struggling with where to send the boy to school since he had recently finished kindergarten.


He also said Benoit's wife didn't want him to quit wrestling, but she "wanted him to be at home more to care for the kid. She'd say she can't take care of him by herself when he was on the road."


The child suffered from a rare medical condition called Fragile X Syndrome, an inherited form of mental retardation often accompanied by autism, McDevitt said.


Over the past weekend, authorities said, Benoit strangled his wife, suffocated his son and placed a Bible next to their bodies before hanging himself with a weight-machine cable in the couple's suburban home. No motive was offered for the killings, which were discovered Monday.


Anabolic steroids were found in Benoit's home, leading officials to wonder whether the drugs played a role in the slayings. Some experts believe steroids cause paranoia, depression and violent outbursts known as "roid rage."



The WWE, based in Stamford, Conn., issued a news release Tuesday saying steroids "were not and could not be related to the cause of death" and that the findings indicate "deliberation, not rage." It also added that Benoit tested negative April 10, the last time he was tested for drugs.


Also Wednesday, Benoit's personal physician said the wrestler did not give any indication he was troubled when he met with the doctor hours before the start of the weekend.


Benoit had been under the care of Dr. Phil Astin, a longtime friend, for treatment of low testosterone levels. Astin said the condition likely originated from previous steroid use.


Astin prescribed testosterone for Benoit in the past but would not say what, if any, medications he prescribed the day of their meeting.


"He was in my office on Friday to stop by just to see my staff," Astin said. "He certainly didn't show any signs of any distress or rage or anything."


"I'm still very surprised and shocked, especially with his child Daniel involved," Astin said. "He worshipped his child."


District Attorney Scott Ballard said the autopsy indicated that there were no bruise marks on the child's neck, so authorities are now assuming he could have been killed using a choke hold. "It's a process of elimination," he said.

The boy had old needle marks in his arms, Ballard said. He said he had been told the parents considered him undersized and had given him growth hormones.

"The boy was very small, even dwarfed," Ballard said.


The Benoits' argument over their son was not the only friction in their marriage. Nancy Benoit had filed for a divorce in 2003, saying the couple's three-year marriage was irrevocably broken and alleging "cruel treatment." She later dropped the complaint.


Meanwhile, authorities in Georgia were investigating a link between Benoit and a Florida business that may have supplied him with steroids.


Prosecutors in upstate New York who have been investigating the company's drug sales said Benoit received deliveries from Signature Pharmacy and MedXLife.com, which sold steroids, human growth hormone and testosterone on the Internet.


Six people, including two of the pharmacy's owners, have pleaded guilty in the investigation, and 20 more have been arrested, including doctors and pharmacists.


"That's something that sounds like we ought to be investigating," Ballard told the AP on Wednesday.


A lawyer for MedXLife co-owner Dr. Gary Brandwein scoffed at allegations that his client's company sold steroids to Benoit.


"I've only read that in the paper. I have no direct information about that whatsoever," Terence Kindlon said Wednesday, adding that prosecutors in Albany County, N.Y., were trying to "distract everyone's attention from the fact that their case is disintegrating."


Brandwein, a 44-year-old osteopath from Boca Raton, Fla., has pleaded not guilty to six counts in New York state court related to the criminal sale of a controlled substance. He was accused of signing and sending prescriptions without ever seeing patients.


Telephone messages left for attorneys for Brian Schafler and Greg Trotta -- two other co-owners of MedXLife -- were not immediately returned Wednesday. The two men have pleaded guilty to felony third-degree diversion of prescription medications and prescriptions, admitting they helped get drugs in 2006 for customers in upstate New York who had no medical need for them.


McDevitt said the drugs found in Benoit's house were legitimately prescribed. "There's no question, none of these drugs are out there, none of these drugs came from Internet pharmacies," he said.


In addition to causing paranoia and explosive outbursts, steroids can also contribute to deep depression, according to experts.


"Just as you have the extreme high of when you're on steroids, you can get the opposite," said Dr. Todd Schlifstein, a clinical assistant professor at the New York University School of Medicine. "You can have a dramatic difference in mood swings. You can feel there's no hope, there's no future."

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/print...751&type=story

I guess drugs weren't the reason, family problems were.

[Murphy3]

conditions such as the one mentioned are devastating to families.... it's not surprising that such conditions lead to this type of desparation....

[Male30Dan]

Things just keep getting more and more strange with this story:

You have to read this... How can this be explained???

[Male30Dan]

Well - I guess everything can be explained!

[Dtownsfinest]

Undersized? What the hell is wrong with being undersized? Just a horrible story and I WAS a fan of Chris Benoit. That guy has taken a lot of damage to his body his career but nothing can excuse you for killing a 7 year old boy. He did nothing wrong.

[Dirkgreatness]

Scripted storylines don't reveal reasons for Benoit tragedy

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Elizabeth Merrill
ESPN.com

FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. -- The house, by most appearances, is immaculate and perfect. The fireplace, the wooden deck, the private staircase climbing up to a little boy's room. The circle driveway and the red Hummer.

When fact blurred to fantasy, Nancy Benoit never told people this, that in high school, all she really wanted to be was a housewife. Now her house is where the story ends and the spectacle begins.

It takes a good navigational system to get to the Benoit home, past a gravel road, through a narrow two-lane spin with tall Georgia trees on both sides. Gawkers have inched by for days, peering through the metal gate for answers. A woman rolled in from North Carolina the other night, reeking of alcohol, firing a volley of "why's" as a neighbor went to get his mail. She allegedly pelted him with rocks and wound up in jail.


The Benoits' house in Fayetteville, Ga., where wrestling star Chris Benoit allegedly killed his wife, Nancy, and 7-year-old Daniel, then later hung himself.
"It's certainly surreal," says Fayette County district attorney Scott Ballard. "I've used the word bizarre. There are so many bizarre things about it."

The why might never be answered -- why Chris Benoit, wrestling superstar, alleged family man, apparently murdered his wife on a Friday, strangled his son on a Saturday then wrapped a cord from his weight machine around his neck and hung himself on a Sunday.

Because they lived in a world of scripted storylines, flying clotheslines and outlandish ring names, it took nearly a day for some WWE fans to believe that Benoit and his family were actually dead. Some still can't swallow it.

But fiction, those close to the case will say, could not trump the reality on Green Meadow Lane.

Ballard sits in his office across town at 5:30 p.m., after office hours because the Benoit case has evolved into a round-the-clock, breaking-news buffet of Geraldo and Greta proportions. Before Monday, Ballard had no idea who Benoit was. Maybe, he says, nobody really did.

He's describing how rigormortis had set in by the time they found Nancy, whose skin was marbleized as she lay face-down on the floor. He's remembering his walk into Daniel's room -- the 7-year-old boy's body was gone, but posters of his dad still hung on the wall, and two toy wrestling belts sat on a shelf.

There was every indication, Ballard says, that Daniel Benoit adored his father.

"I pray for two things," Ballard says. "That he didn't know about his mother's death and he was asleep when he was strangled.

"I don't think anybody can give me a why for that little boy being strangled that would satisfy me. I will never understand that."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Jim Daus was headed out to dinner Monday night when a call pierced his steeply-planted world.

Nancy was dead.

Before she was "Woman," before she graced the covers of wrestling magazines and was drooled over by teenage boys, Nancy Benoit was Nancy Daus, a Florida girl who dropped out of high school to marry her boyfriend Jim.

They were high school sweethearts, kids with no money and little to do, and on Sunday nights, Jim grabbed his girl and whisked her to Orlando to watch wrestling. It was new for Nancy, whose protective parents at first didn't let her go. But he had front-row seats, and the couple was lured by the drama, the machismo, the circus.

"How would I describe it? Male soap opera," Daus says. "You follow the storylines like you'd watch a soap opera on TV. It builds, and you have to wait 'til Monday to find out the next chapter."

He used to call it fate, being in the right place at the right time. One night a wrestler grabbed Jim's chair, heaved it into the crowd and a camera clicked away at Nancy's surprised expression. She was discovered that night, joined wrestler Kevin Sullivan's entourage, and her life as a valet/diva/manager put her in leather and chains and took her everywhere from Texas to Hawaii.

For a while, Daus was a happy part of the ride. They grew up fast and owned their first house as teenagers. Eventually, there was no room for him on the tour.

On New Year's Day -- Daus isn't sure what year -- he picked her up from the airport, heard all the places she was booked for and said they were drifting in different directions. He suggested a divorce. Within days, they were seeing the same lawyer.

"We cried a lot that day," he says. "It was very hard on me. That was the toughest year of my life, the year I got divorced."

He stopped watching wrestling. It was too painful. Nancy's career skyrocketed, and she married Sullivan, a booker/wrestler known for his satanic references in the ring. If the entourage ultimately pulled Nancy away from Jim, it almost seemed fitting that another wrestling saga eventually pried her away from Sullivan.


Authorities are investigating whether steroids may have been a factor in the deaths of Chris Benoit, above, his wife and child.
By the mid-1990s, Sullivan was on the outs with Nancy, and scripted an angle that had her canoodling with Benoit. Wrestling fans knew her as "Woman." Benoit called her Nancy. In a life-imitates-art moment, they fell in love.

Some people thought it was an odd combination -- Chris the quiet workmanlike wrestler, Nancy the headstrong, career-savvy manager. Some also wondered why she gave it all up, left the business to be a stay-at-home wife and mother.

She disappeared from the spotlight, showing up occasionally at her husband's side. In the flurry of video clips of the past week, she's seen hugging Chris while confetti rains down on another wrestling victory. He's shown kissing his little boy as the emotions seep from his sweaty, sculpted body.

How much did anyone know about what went on with the Benoits? She filed a divorce petition in 2003, and withdrew it a few months later. She also filed a temporary protection order from domestic abuse, and later dropped that, too.

Richard Decker, an attorney for Nancy's parents, Paul and Maureen Toffoloni, said the family had no reason to believe there was turmoil on those 8.6 acres in Fayetteville.

"None. Zero," Decker says. "They had a normal son-in-law relationship with Chris. They didn't treat him as a superstar, and he didn't want to be treated as a superstar. He took out the trash and they treated him as anyone would treat a son in law. (The couple) had a close and loving relationship as far as they knew."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


The testimonials for Chris Benoit, pre- and post-death, are almost pre-recorded from those close to him. Hard worker, they say. Loyal, polite and quiet. Passionate.


In the week since the apparent murder-suicide, fans have left flowers, notes, photos and action figurines on the wall outside the Benoit's home.
Nearly everybody in the wrestling business has a story of how they saw Benoit within the past couple of weeks, and he seemed like the same man who crawled through the ropes and into fantasy more than two decades ago.

One close friend, who declined to be named, says he vacillates from wanting to block the whole thing out to gluing himself to the Internet in search of the latest developments. One morsel of information might crack this thing, and explain the invisible demons.

It's one thing to grieve the death of a good friend. But how do you mourn a monster?

"Do I still love this guy or do I walk away hating this guy who's so out there that he could actually kill his wife and son," the friend says. "It's hard to distinguish, and you can't meet them both halfway."

When wrestling fans wanted to be marveled by gimmicks, they followed any number of spandex-wearing musclemen. When they wanted a good show, they watched Benoit. He was old-school, he was intense, and his gimmick was that he really didn't have one.

"People looked forward to his matches," says Mike Mooneyham, co-author of "Sex, Lies, and Headlocks," a book about the WWE. "He was believable, realistic and probably one of the greatest workers over the last 10 or 15 years. If it was a bad show, Chris could save it in his match."

Reality has never been a staple of professional wrestling. Its stars are cut from granite; its canned drama could cause the most gullible to collectively roll their eyes. And then there's the schedule. In the old days, Russ Hart says, they'd bond on eight- or nine-hour bus trips together, riding from show to show, taking chairs to the head until the next stop.

The average professional wrestler today spends between 200 and 250 days of the year on the road. Some jokingly call "Marriott" their home address. Others become caught up in their make-believe lives in the ring. Flyin' Brian Pillman wrestled with a loose cannon gimmick that eventually led to him being fired by the WCW. He crashed his Hummer into a tree, slipped into a coma, and became addicted to painkillers. He died in a Minnesota hotel room, at the age of 35, of an undetected heart ailment.

Benoit's secrets -- and not-so-little-secrets -- have unraveled in the week since his death. The office of his friend, Dr. Phil Astin, was raided last week. Authorities want to know what might have been in Benoit's system at the time of the apparent murder-suicide. Friends of Benoit's say it was obvious long before last weekend that the wrestler was using performance-enhancing drugs.

"I don't think anybody had any illusions about whether he was on steroids," Hart says. " … just by looking at his physique and the muscle mass he had."

And then there were the statements by a WWE attorney this week who said the Benoits had recently been arguing over the care of Daniel, who reportedly had Fragile X Syndrome. Many people close to Benoit, including his in-laws, said they were unaware of any mental ailment.

That was typical Chris -- keeping to himself, hiding.

"You've got to realize that athletes generally handle their problems physically, so we're probably not the best with relationships," says Bill Watts, a former wrestler and promoter. "But here's the problem with athletes: It's not the fear of hope or reward that guides you, it's the fear of loss. You're always trying to look for the edge, to do whatever you can to maintain it so you push all the parameters.

"You can't live this persona and turn it off when you go home and read the newspaper or watch the news. It becomes you."

By all accounts, Chris Benoit was just being Chris Benoit on the afternoon of June 22. He visited Astin's office, took the hour-plus ride to Carrollton, Ga., through at least two construction zones and handfuls of stops, and smiled for a fan in a picture that has been plastered all over the national media. He made plans to fly to a WWE event over the weekend.

And then Benoit bound his wife's wrists and feet and strangled her.

Interviews have given Ballard, the district attorney, a better idea of who the Benoits were. But they haven't answered most of the questions.

"A lot of people who knew him are very complimentary of him," Ballard says.

He pauses.

"I wonder how well they knew him."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Dinah Lawrence is a blonde-haired mother from Social Circle, Ga., who carries a metal casket on her keychain and a love of wrestling in her heart. She's made the hour-long trek here, to the Benoit house, with her 20-year-old son Chris.


Wrestling fans Dinah Lawrence and son Chris, 20, drove to pay their respects to the Benoits. They met Chris Benoit last year during an appearance at the Mall of Georgia in Duluth.
They met Benoit more than a year ago, at the Mall of Georgia, when their hero was on a publicity stop. Most wrestlers shake a few hands and go on their way, Di says. Benoit was different. He spent 30 minutes with her, talking about everything from her studies to become a funeral director to the fact that her son shared his name.

It was one of Benoit's first public appearances since the death of his good friend Eddie Guerrero, who died in another Minnesota hotel room, at 38, of heart failure. Benoit told the complete strangers about his friend, and mugged for a picture. Lawrence brought a copy of the photo to the Benoit house on Thursday, along with a hand-written note that she placed near an action figure of Benoit.

"This is what I want to remember," Lawrence says as she stares at the picture. "The guy who was just … the guy next door."

When police discovered the bodies on Monday, it touched off tears, finger pointing and general confusion among wrestling fans. Monday night's WWE "Raw" broadcast was supposed to focus on the fictitious death of chairman Vince McMahon, whose limousine exploded in a television scene a few weeks ago. Could the grisly stories emanating from the Atlanta area be make-believe, too?

"I probably had 50 or 60 messages Monday," Mooneyham says, "and most of them weren't convinced.

"That line between fact and fiction is so blurred that fans don't even know."

The Benoit house is remote enough that cell phones spin from roaming to no service, but his fans keep coming. They leave potted plants, a smashed-up guitar, a baggie of uncooked macaroni. Near the gate is a note that says, "I love you."

Di's note fills an entire page.

"I'm so sorry you felt this was (the) solution to your problems …" it says.

Every couple of minutes, a man is seen through one of the first-floor windows. It's an investigator trying to piece together last weekend.

"He was like your best friend," Lawrence says. "It's hard to equate what happened in there with what we saw."


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The first three nights after Nancy Benoit's body was found, Jim Daus couldn't sleep.

He's been remarried for nearly 20 years now, and has a job in the real world marketing propane and natural-gas products. His work takes him on the road a lot. It almost seems strange -- years after Nancy was going places he couldn't, Jim's job takes him everywhere.

Nine years ago, scrambling to catch a flight in Chicago, he found a seat in the back of the plane, looked up and saw a familiar face. It was Nancy. They talked for three or four hours and reminisced. They had that kind of relationship, no bad blood, just laughs and memories and a little sadness. Jim has been to two wrestling matches since their divorce, and took his son there once. He hated it, and they've never gone back.

Now, wrestling is keeping him awake, bringing him more pain.

"For years, I told everybody (her discovery) was the right place at the right time," he says. "What happened to Nancy … it kind of feels like the wrong place at the wrong time.

"That's why I feel bad. I pushed her into this whole thing."

He wonders why she stayed and what happened in that big house on Green Meadow Lane. Maybe, he says, Nancy tried too hard to make it work. She was stubborn like that.

He knew at some point, she was happy. The last time they communicated was by e-mail seven years ago, when Daniel was born.

He congratulated her and remembered how they didn't want kids. But that was fantasy. This was reality.

"Congratulations on your son, too," she wrote back. "I guess some things change."

Elizabeth Merrill is a senior writer for ESPN.com. She can be reached at merrill2323@hotmail.com.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/print...166&type=story